This section is intended to provide a background or context to the invention that is recited in the claims. The description herein may include concepts that could be pursued, but are not necessarily ones that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, what is described in this section is not prior art to the description and claims in this application and is not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
In some apparatuses which are able to transmit signals by a transmitter may utilize an amplifier which amplifies the signal to be transmitted before the signal is fed to an antenna. Such amplifiers may utilize a so-called push-pull configuration (circuit) in which two transistors are connected together in a certain manner. The transistors are semiconductor elements which may have e.g. an input and two outputs. With bibolar transistors the input may be called as a base and the output ports are called an emitter and a collector. With field effect transistors (FET) such as MOSFETs (metal-oxide on silicon field effect transistor) the input may be called as a gate and the outputs may be called as a source and a drain. In the push-pull circuit one of the transistors is of a pnp-type (or p-type) and the other transistor is of an npn-type (or n-type). Ideally, one of the transistors pushes current to a load when the input is above a certain voltage level and the other transistor pulls current from the load when the input is below the voltage level. However, in practical implementations it may occur that when the input is near the voltage level both transistors may be active i.e. one transistor pushes current to the source and the other transistor simultaneously pulls current from the load. This causes a current spike at the output of the push-pull circuit which may disturb the amplified signal and increase power consumption. This current may also be called as leaking current because it does not go to the load but leaks from one transistor to the other. The push-pull circuit is also used in many other circuits than amplifiers. It may be used e.g. in digital integrated circuits for example as output ports or in internal logic circuits or as semiconductor switches.